Damascus Santoku Knife, Ram Horn Handle and Carved Cover

Cut a potato into slices and watch them climb the side of the blade and stay there until you knock them off. The dimples down this flat are aimed at that. The blade is 7 inches of Damascus over a high carbon core, tall with a straight edge, and the handle is ram horn. How much the dimples help is worth being honest about.

Specification

The blade

Damascus over a high carbon core in a twist pattern, which comes from winding a layered bar round on itself before it is drawn out again. The layers spiral and the acid opens them into rings. Decoration. The carbon core underneath takes the edge. Along the flat sits a row of ground dimples. The shape is a santoku, tall with a flat edge and a blunt rounded tip, so it chops straight down onto the board instead of rolling forward. Carbon steel darkens to grey and will spot if left wet.

The handle

Ram horn is harder and heavier than it looks, ridged where the animal grew it, running from honey coloured to nearly black across one piece. It sits on a full tang with three brass pins straight through. The handle is 5 inches, and on a chopping knife that length does something particular. A downward cut is driven from the wrist and forearm rather than from a roll, so your hand wants to sit well back with the blade hanging under it.

The leather blade cover

Vegetable tanned leather, hand stitched, cut to the outline of this tall blade so it seats with some friction. A welt is sewn into the seam, so the thread rides in a channel and never lies against the edge. The face is carved rather than stamped, a thistle and scroll cut with a swivel knife and worked with punches. It covers the blade. The handle stays outside, ready for a drawer or a roll.

Who it suits

This goes to cooks who chop rather than rock and want to know what the dimples do first.

• Anyone cutting vegetables in straight cuts
• Cooks who find a chef knife too long
• Buyers who like ram horn and carved leather
• People working through root vegetables

What comes in the box

• The 7 inch Damascus santoku
• The hand carved thistle and scroll blade cover
• A care card
• Free sharpening for life

Every piece is different

Horn is grown, so no two handles carry the same ridges or the same run of colour. A twist depends on how far the bar was wound and where the grinder took it back, so the swirls land differently every time. Each thistle is cut freehand. The photograph shows a model.

Looking after it

Hand wash it and dry it right away, dimples included, since water sits in a dished hollow longer than it sits on a flat. Food safe mineral oil over the whole blade afterwards, and the horn takes an occasional wipe of the same. Boards should be wood or plastic. Sharpen on a whetstone at roughly 20 degrees per side and finish on a strop. The care and sharpening page goes further.

Put a name on it

Engraving is 20 dollars per blade, added on this page. Around 30 characters fits. The dimples take the middle of the flat, so lettering goes above them near the spine where the twist is quietest. A proof image shows that before the laser starts. Reckon on 3 to 5 business days. From 10 blades up we stop charging. There is more on the engraving page.

Questions buyers ask

Do the dimples stop food sticking? They help. They break the flat into pockets, so a wet slice has less to grip and air gets behind. They do not end the problem.

Then why not dimple every knife? A thin blade has little side contact anyway. A tall flat sided one has plenty, which is where dimples earn their place.

Do they weaken the blade? They are ground well up from the edge, so they take nothing off the part that cuts.

What is a santoku shape for? Chopping straight down. The edge is flat, so all of it lands at once and nothing is left joined at the bottom. It will not rock.

Will it rust? It can. There is carbon steel beneath the pattern. Dry it, oil it, and keep it away from a dishwasher.

How long until it arrives? Most US orders arrive in 5 to 7 business days.

Take the flat edge further and you have the Damascus nakiri in burl wood and blue resin, a rectangle with no curve at all, while a cooked roast wants the 9 inch Damascus carving knife on stag antler. It sits in kitchen knives, etched blades in Damascus steel, board shapes in chef knives.